


Heartbeats in Silence

by melanchologist



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Character Death, Heartbreak, M/M, Mary shelley inspired, One Shot, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Romance, but not really, sort of dark! Will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-22 23:29:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13177494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melanchologist/pseuds/melanchologist
Summary: After the fall, Will wakes up alone on the beach determined to find Hannibal. He does find him, but not in the state which he had hoped. Love and heartbreak take over and he does what he must to make sure he doesn't lose Hannibal.(Inspired by the story of Percy Shelley's body washing up onshore after his death and Mary Shelley keeping his heart as a keepsake.)





	Heartbeats in Silence

The ocean destroys. It is a powerful entity that breathes chaos and calm all at once. Its tendril arms reach to the surface and try to drag down anything it can into the abysses where some of the few undiscovered mysteries of nature lie. To thwart its forceful pull takes everything you have, every ounce of your life force, and a hefty dose of luck.

Miraculously, Will Graham had both.

He woke, gasping with sand in his mouth and nose. He rubbed the salt water out of his eyes and gradually brought himself back to reality. He had been stabbed in the cheek, blood still oozing down his jaw and soaking his already drenched clothes even redder.

_It does look black in the moonlight._

So much blood. So much pain. But beneath that a fire the likes of which he had never felt. A fire that had been sparking for years while he actively suppressed it. But it could not be contained. It roared to life under the moon with a knife in his hands and Hannibal by his side.

_Hannibal._

This was his doing. No, not just Hannibal. It was equally Will’s endeavor to slay the dragon. Their first act as a matched pair. Their destinies come to realization.

They were meant to be together, the universe had made that clear enough. So had Will’s heart. They could not exist without the other.

But right now, they were not together, which was wholly unacceptable. Anxiety struck him like lightning and Will startled up, agony immediately coursing throughout his body.

He looked around, assessing his surroundings before proceeding. He was on a black sand beach, almost pitch black with only subtle moonlight illuminating the rocky crags of the cove around him. He didn’t know how far he was from where he had fallen. He wasn’t planning on jumping; he just jumped. In the moment, it felt right- the only possible way to ensure that he and Hannibal never separated. They would die together or live together, and falling off the bluff was a wager between the two.

Hannibal couldn’t be far, Will told himself. They fell in exactly the same place and this was where Will washed up, so Hannibal shouldn’t be too far off.

Getting up and standing in the sand took every ounce of Will’s effort. He limped forward a few steps experimentally and started off in the direction of a nearby rock, which he could walk along and hold onto to support his weight. Getting on the other side of it should let him see more of the beach, he assumed.

Agonizingly, he made it to the rock and grabbed onto any handhold he could find. The waves were pounding into the rocks at his ankles and could reach higher at any second. The spray stung his eyes as he made his way around the rock and looked out to the other stretch of beach, just barely making out a lumpy shape on the shore.

He rubbed the salt from his eyes and saw that it was him, Hannibal, lying on his side facing away from Will. But he wasn’t moving.

“Hannibal!” Will cried out.

No response.

“Hannibal, wake up!”

Will wouldn’t give up hope and crawled over to where Hannibal lay. He put his arm on his shoulder, horrified to feel how cold his skin was, and turned him so he could see his face.

Hannibal’s eyes were closed as if in sleep and his lips were blue, covered in sand.

Will, frozen in shock, stared at the lifeless face of the man who had come to mean so much to him. Had destroyed and been destroyed, but persisted despite all of it.

He couldn’t be dead, not like this. Will had imagined Hannibal’s death in his mind countless times. His hands wrapped around his neck. His gun on his forehead. But that was before. Now Hannibal was part of his being, part of his soul, and there was no going back. He needed Hannibal. Without him his life had no meaning.

_I’ve never known myself as well as I know myself when I’m with him._

Will had not thought of a future without Hannibal by his side. When he joined Hannibal in spilling blood on the bluff, it joined them for life. They were doomed to be forever side by side since the moment they first met, it had just taken Will some time to realize it.

He shakily brought his hand to Hannibal’s wrist. Already knowing what to expect, but not willing to admit it to himself just yet.

Nothing. Only cold, dead flesh.

Will shook violently. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear; he was completely overrun with the fiercest dread he had ever experienced. Tears rushed to his eyes and he bent over Hannibal’s body, his whole form wracked with sobbing. He gripped onto Hannibal’s arm with the lingering power left in him, sinking his nails into the skin.

“No, no, no, please.” He cried, his voice barely audible and full of cracks, much like the rest of him. “Please, Hannibal.”

Will rested his head on Hannibal’s unmoving chest, trying his best to keep breathing. He couldn’t even imagine getting up or doing anything but laying here, holding onto the only thing that truly mattered in his life.

The waves reached up and enveloped them both, attempting to pull Hannibal back into the wrath that had killed him. Will grasped onto Hannibal’s waist frantically, refusing to let him go. Nothing would separate them. Not man, not nature, not an act of God. Hannibal had spent his life disregarding any god’s will; he would continue to do so in death.  
A glint of light caught Will’s eye suddenly, drawing him out of the trance-like state of heartbreak he was trapped in.

There was a knife lying only a few feet away from him. The dragon had wounded him with it, but Will gutted the dragon in turn. And the weapon had followed him here, like a lucky charm of sorts. But in the most macabre of ways.

Without even being aware of it, he crawled over to the knife and gripped it in a shaking hand. One thought had taken charge over all others: _I will not lose him. He is mine and I am his._

Then he knew what he must do. Hannibal loved him, he knew, and had proved it with a token of his affections. A heart made of a skinned human body, bared for Will and Will only to truly see. His heart belonged to Will now, he would want Will to have it in any way he could.

He looked at the knife, then back at Hannibal’s face. He lowered the knife and lowered his head, inhaling the scent of salt and death and blood. With his free hand he caressed Hannibal’s eyelids. His cheekbones. His lips. His features were as recognizable to Will as his own, if not more. Then he slowly brought his lips to meet Hannibal’s, pressing them together gently. He held onto his jaw and ran his hand down his neck, wishing that Hannibal could feel this too, that Hannibal could reach up and put his fingers in his hair and tell him everything was going to be okay. It was too cold a kiss, unnaturally so, but it was the only one they would ever have. His heart ached as tears poured from his eyes and onto Hannibal’s face beneath him.

Will pulled back and forcefully stabbed the knife into Hannibal’s chest, cutting a deep enough incision to pull back the skin. He reached in through the muscles and the ribs and the barely warm blood pooling around his hand and found what he was looking for. Using the knife to get a clean cut, he removed Hannibal’s heart from his body and looked at it up close as it dripped onto the sand.

_For you_ , it whispered to him. _Only for you._

_I will keep it forever,_ Will thought. _If I can’t have all of you, then I will have this. And I will continue to live the way you wanted me to. I’ve seen how beautiful your plan is for me and I will follow it through to the end._

Ripping shreds from the remnants of Hannibal’s shirt, he wrapped the heart in cloth for safekeeping and held it close to his chest. He sat back and watched as the waves lapped against Hannibal’s corpse, pulling him farther and farther away.

Soon the ocean swallowed him up into the depths. Will’s love, lost. But not entirely. He held in his hands the source of that love. Limping up the beach, Will vowed to prove his love for Hannibal. He would survive this and give all those who had wronged him the reckoning they deserved. The chrysalis had hatched and now he was reborn as a creature with two hearts and two souls.

In the moonlight, he looked like an avenging god, covered in war paint, ruthless and bloodthirsty. The black sky, the black ocean, the black blood, and a deep red heart.

 

 

And then there was light. Startlingly white and surprisingly warm. A stark contrast to where he had been suffering only moments earlier.

A single light bulb dangled from the wood ceiling above him. He blinked in confusion as he adjusted to his unfamiliar surroundings.

His head ached fiercely and he reached up to find it bandaged nicely along with his shoulder. The blood was washed away and the salt and sand gone.

He tried to remember what had happened that led him here but came up blank. He had no idea where he was or who had brought him here, but he knew he needed his heart back. Wherever it was, he had to find it.

The door to his room was shut so Will brought himself off the bed with much difficulty and started towards it, hoping it wasn’t locked.

He turned the knob and was met with no resistance, so he cautiously opened it and peered to the other side.

To his great surprise, he found a normal-looking living room of a log cabin, with a fireplace and everything. Some bloodstains in the carpet were the only signs that he had actually come through here and wasn’t just dreaming.

The fireplace was lit and down the hall the kitchen light was on. Will heard some sizzling sounds coming from that direction and he felt his heart pang with hope.

_It can’t be. He was dead. I cut out his heart and held it in my hand._

Breathing heavy and shaking, Will made himself take the few steps necessary into the kitchen. Every step felt like a mile and he felt like his limbs were made of lead, but he kept going. He had to know.

He turned the corner and saw the form standing over the stove. He felt complete and utter disbelief at this sight.

It was Hannibal, all in one piece in a dark gray sweater and pants, sautéing some mushrooms in a pan on the stove. Looking so normal you almost wouldn’t believe what events had recently transpired on the cliff.

_I must be dreaming. This can’t be._

Will shook violently as his teeth chattered. He didn’t know what to think or what to do but look.

Sensing his presence, Hannibal raised his head and turned around to face Will. Their eyes locked and Will felt the breath leave his lungs in a rush.

“Will, are you alright?”

“You, you were dead. I held onto your corpse on the beach. It was you, I know it was.” His voice was barely a whisper, but Hannibal heard him and stepped closer.

“You were feverish for several days, Will. Unconscious until now as I tended to your wounds.”

The information slammed into Will. The whole grotesque scene had been only a figment of his imagination. “But.. it all felt so real. The water and the cold and the blood.”

“Indeed, those were all factors we dealt with after the fall. I grabbed you from the water and brought you back here so that both of us might recover from our battle wounds. And it seems that we have both done so.”

_Could it really be that easy? Could everything really have worked out so well for us, in the end?_ Will was a stranger to the concept of things working out in his favor, it all just seemed so unlikely.

“How? How is this possible?”

“Nothing is impossible, Will. The forces of nature attempted to separate us, but I was determined to keep us together. After your becoming, I couldn’t lose you. I may have almost died in the process, but I am here now. And so are you. And that is what counts.”

Hannibal stepped towards Will again and again until he was less than a foot away. Will was frozen, too shocked to respond.

“Will?” Hannibal brought his hand up to Will’s face and held his chin, curiously turning his head to look at his wound. “Are you alright?”

The physical contact brought Will back into his body. He put his hand over Hannibal’s and moved in closer.

“I thought I had lost you. I thought you were dead. And it was the worst feeling in the world.”

“You can’t be rid of me that easily I’m afraid.”

Will threw his arms around Hannibal’s shoulders, pressing his face into his neck and inhaling the scent of him, reveling in the warmth radiating from his body.

He placed his palm on Hannibal’s chest, feeling the steady rise and fall of his heart beating. It ignited a feverish frenzy in his own heart and his pulse raced. They were one and the same now, bonded so that their hearts beat in synchrony.

Will looked up at Hannibal and found his gaze full of yearning. Full of appreciation. Full of love. When Bedelia had asked if Will ached for him, he wasn’t ready to face his own answer. But now he knew. He wasn’t ready to confess the truth just yet, but knew he couldn’t keep it a secret for very long.

“Don’t worry, Will. We have all the time in the world. Just us.”

“Just us.”

“We will be monsters alone in the world, but we will have each other.”

_And that is all I need,_ Will thought.

**Author's Note:**

> So I was reading Call Me By Your Name (which is amazing btw) and they described this story about Mary Shelley's husband and Elio was imagining if Oliver had drowned how he would cut out his heart and wrap it in his shirt and keep it. That image just kept haunting me so I wrote this. 
> 
> I also threw in another Mary Shelley quote from Frankenstein at the end there, kudos to you if you know it. I've always thought it fit perfectly with Hannigram and finally had the opportunity to use it. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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